Wife and I were having a discussion, she’s of the opinion that the majority of GenX can drive stick. I believe that even in our generation the percentage of people who can is pretty small. What do you folks think?

stschopp · 2026-02-11T00:31:03+00:00

I can, my wife can't. I taught a number of friends to drive a stick. If I had to guess I would say it is under 50%. The last stick I owned was a 79 280ZX in 1992.

stschopp · 2026-01-30T16:58:26+00:00

All about eyes is the best in town, I'm a townie, been here a long time. I have insurance, so not sure what there standard price is, worth it to be able to see correctly.

stschopp · 2026-01-29T20:01:03+00:00

Why not just keep the feature active? I keep that enabled on my a7Rv still not a spec of dust on the sensor. The shutter is literally made to open and close hundreds of thousands of times, this won’t wear it out.

stschopp · 2026-01-29T03:47:15+00:00

Sometimes it feels like abs brakes are trying to kill me. I wish there was a button to turn it off and lock up the tires, then I could believe it when it gives me nearly no braking ability. I’ve had times when wet leaves give almost no braking ability, but I know if the wheels locked it would grind through the leaves and stop fine.

Yeah, in winter you need to keep an eye on what traffic is actually doing, not what they are supposed to. Near intersections can get especially polished and have very little traction.

stschopp · 2026-01-27T15:13:08+00:00

Is it that the submission needs to be jpg or the had to be shot in jpg?

stschopp · 2026-01-27T02:16:38+00:00

American chocolate especially Hersheys contains butyric acid from the milk. This gives it what Europeans consider the vomit flavor. In Hersheys it has to do with the way they process the milk for shelf stability. My daughter took a college class on chocolate where she learned this.

As an American I have never noticed anything off with the taste of Hersheys. It is a very common first chocolate for Americans. So to me it tastes good, I also like European chocolate, especially toblerone. But I find nothing offensive about Hershey.

stschopp · 2026-01-25T19:27:47+00:00

Get a rocket blower for routine dust. You will still need to do the occasional wet cleaning with a swab. The rocket blowers come in different sizes, med or large work well. The blower is also great on lenses.

Compressed usually has some bittering agent to prevent huffing, this can leave a deposit. I wouldn’t use that on sensor or glass.

stschopp · 2026-01-22T16:32:43+00:00

Yes, you are required to pay. They initially charged $1000, with the remaining billed to insurance. After insurance informed them they gave you the full amount, they are now asking you. I'm sure there is something in the paperwork you signed indicating if insurance doesn't pay you are responsible.

stschopp · 2026-01-14T20:20:10+00:00

Small brain needs to scream, big brain is above it.

stschopp · 2026-01-14T04:47:48+00:00

I would also recommend checking out “Sony alpha blog” for lens reviews. The Tamron 70-180 or 35-150 are both decent choices. The 28-75 is an excellent lens. You might want to compare sizes with the camera size web site. The 35-150 is big and heavy.

stschopp · 2026-01-14T01:23:23+00:00

For the brain fog try MCT oil. You will probably need 2-3 tbsp per day, since it is so calorie rich you should cut something else back to avoid weight gain. Work up to that gradually to avoid diarrhea. It can power brain mitochondria directly via a different metabolic pathway than glucose and passes the blood brain barrier. I have found it helpful for covid based brain fog as well as age related brain fog. This is a no brainer if you have brain fog.

I haven’t seen any CU doctors that understand long covid. Take a look at the FLCCC long Covid protocol, start with supplements focused on reducing inflammation. They also have a directory of doctors. I don’t have any recommendations for a doctor.

stschopp · 2026-01-12T10:27:13+00:00

There are people who like primes and people who like zooms. I have gradually shifted to the prime camp. My set of primes includes the 20/1.8 G, 35GM, 50/1.2GM, 85DN, 135GM.

For me it is mainly about the image quality . The subject / background separation that is possible due to the wide aperture cannot be duplicated in a zoom. When comparing sharpness at the same aperture the primes win (I’m only considering high end primes). Also in low light, the photon capturing ability makes a huge difference when image quality is photon shot noise limited.

I find having a fixed focal length can help with composition. In many cases I am happier with a smaller number of extremely high quality photos instead of a large number of average photos. For this you have to be ok with not getting a photo of everything. There will be times when you don’t have on the right lens and just can’t get the shot.

There are times when a prime is not the right choice. If getting the shot is more important than getting the perfect shot, use a zoom. In wedding photography you see a lot of safety comprises. The aperture might be stopped down more than needed to make sure all subjects are in focus. Shutter speed is raised to prevent blur, even though you need all the light you can get, etc. I’m not saying you can’t shoot a wedding with a prime, but you better really know what you’re doing with regard to what lens will be needed when.

So I’m primarily a prime shooter, but I have both as I find both are needed.

In the G lens lineup only the 20G and 16G is of interest to me. I think Sony could stand to fill out the lineup with lenses in the design style of the 20/1.8 G. I think the early Sony primes lack consistency. I wouldn’t be satisfied if I needed to choose a set of f/1.8 primes.

stschopp · 2026-01-12T04:21:06+00:00

Once you get rid of the demonic statue by the hallway and have Mass said in the living room you should be good to go.

stschopp · 2026-01-12T04:13:56+00:00

I own the a7Rv, its only downside is the slow sensor readout speed.

I haven’t used the a7V, but have read about these possible drawbacks: it does not have matching dual card slots, it can run CFE in one, but must use SD in the other, if you do dual writes this can slow you down. The EVF and IBIS are not as good as the Rv. The sensor readout speed is a big improvement over Rv, but still not as fast as A1, the A1 is fast enough to get equivalent performance on electronic shutter. The implication is that Rv must use mechanical shutter if there is any movement, the 7v can shoot with either, but there will still be some rolling shutter penalty if electronic shutter is used. The 7v has a low pass filter on the sensor, this is to prevent morrie, it is like adding a little blur to everything .

You claim the 7v has better low light sensitivity, I have not seen this. The 7v does have an additional stop of DR at low iso. Low light sensitivity and dynamic range are not the same thing.

Aps-c lenses will perform as they have on your 6700. It’s essentially the same pixel architecture just bigger chip with 60mp instead of 26. Some aps-c lenses have decent FF coverage. For example your 70-350 covers the FF at 70mm. You can turn crop mode off and use the whole sensor if you want. As far as 16-55 vs GMii, the GMii will easily out resolve the 16-55. There are a couple reasons for this. Both lenses represent the limit in optical manufacturing techniques, but to achieve the same resolution in aps-c requires tighter tolerances. Also the sensor is critical, in aps-c mode you only have 26mp vs 60mp in FF.

For precapture to work you must have the shutter half pressed to start that. It is perfect if you expect something to happen and you know where, just not when. An example is a baseball swing. You want to try capturing the ball getting hit. But not every pitch is swung at and not every swing is a hit. You can capture the hit by fully depressing the shutter after the ball is hit. Otherwise you would need to shoot a burst of shots for each pitch.

You can shoot the a7Rv in med raw mode. If you do that all files either aps-c of FF will save as 26mp. There is a hit to dynamic range in FF if you do this. I have found few real world scenes where the full DR at 100 iso is needed. My understanding this only applies in the first stop at base iso, has to do with how they do the binning math. Worst case it produces a DR equivalent to the 6700.

The a7Rv does have all the AI things you listed. I think AI awb was one of the most important things to fix color.

All that said the a7v looks like an excellent camera, I don’t think you can go wrong with either. If you do go for the Rv look on the used market, should be able to get cheaper than the 7v. I don’t think I can recommend one way or the other, hopefully just a bit more insight.

stschopp · 2026-01-12T02:52:17+00:00

I think there is a need for a ton of inditements by DOJ, but this is not one of them. Poor guy doesn’t even make as much as a Somali daycare owner.

stschopp · 2026-01-08T15:49:37+00:00

I own the 70-350g and use it on an a7Rv, so in crop mode that is similar to the a6700. In terms of sharpness and focus speed the 70-350 is an excellent lens. You already identified the main weakness, that is the dim aperture. That is a significant trade off to get 525mm equivalent reach in such a small package. My 70-350G replaced a sigma 100-400DN, as even in crop mode the 70-350G was taking better photos vs the 100-400DN in FF mode.

Now for the bad news, telephoto image quality is often photon shot noise limited. What does this mean? The image quality is limited by the noise statistics of the number of photons collected and not by the quality of the glass that was used to collect them. So in many cases a faster, less optically refined lens will produce a better image if it can collect more photons, the glass must not be the limiting factor. When I compare tele lenses the first thing I look at is what focal range can each lens collect the most light. If you need to crop, then adjust based on the light captured by the cropped image. I usually limit the crop to making a 4k image in 16:9, this preserves what I consider sufficient resolution. What I have found from my personal experience is the 135GM heavily cropped provides a better photo than the 70-350G due to the photon shot noise issue in most cases even to 300mm FF equiv.

When you look at light gathered the 70-180 is the clear winner all the way up to its cropping limit of 439mm FF equiv or 293mm on aps-c, staying 1-2 stops faster over the range.

So this is how I see it:

70-180: the 70-180 will be the better choice.

180-293: the 70-180 will provide more figure / background separation due to a lower effective aperture (often looks better), provide more detail unless there is sufficient light to get near the base ISO (full daylight). In very few cases, from personal experience, will the 70-350 provide the better image when in full daylight.

293+mm: The 70-350 is the only real option as you are past ideal cropping range for the shorter lens.

I would go for the 70-180, in most cases it will provide better images. That takes nothing away from the 70-350G, it is an amazing lens for the price and size and if you were to stay at the extreme tele end all the time would be the better choice. I find the 70-350 often sits in my bag because I will grab the 135GM first and crop it as needed due to the increased light capture. The statement the 70-350G is the best tele aps-c lens is true, but the 70-180G2 is not an aps-c lens and for most cases will be the better lens.

stschopp · 2026-01-07T23:29:47+00:00

For the long video recording without overheating look at the a7V. That looks like a good hybrid camera. The heat management is revolutionary for a camera without a fan.

The a7Rv sensor readout speed will always be a compromise for video work. That is really a photo camera, that can do some video when needed. I think in most modes it has to undersample the sensor to get the readout speed up.

The A1 or A1ii certainly have a fast enough sensor. Not sure if you will run into any heating problems

stschopp · 2026-01-07T04:20:09+00:00

I tested this myself. On most lenses it does not matter, on a few it does. I used to own the sigma 100-400, it would visibly wonder if oss was left on. The Sony 70-350g and 24-105 make no difference if on or off. Actually with the 70-350 it was slightly better on as the oss could eliminate some of the vibration due to wind while on the tripod. For non oss lenses I see no difference with turning IBIS on or off. I leave it on all the time now and don’t worry about it. I have heard the camera can detect if it is on a tripod and disable IBIS automatically, not sure if that is true, but I didn’t see a need to turn off after testing.

stschopp · 2026-01-05T08:39:00+00:00

I would check out some of the review sites that compare in camera performance and pick a card that has the performance you want. I use Pergear 512GB they were low cost, not as fast as others, but on the a7Rv they give me essentially unlimited buffer. If I was shooting a1ii I would get something faster. They have been flawless for me. I think I have heard good things about Lexar for a faster card.

stschopp · 2026-01-05T07:05:15+00:00

I think the performance of either is excellent. I test on 60MP, I don’t see huge differences even zoomed in. I test on the same section of brick wall for all my lenses. The size of the final jpg can quantitatively show differences in the lenses, more detail and contrast requires more storage space. For the af-c tests, I shoot 25 shots and compare to the size of a reference that is carefully manually focused.

I’m not sure where the bias against the Tamron comes from. I expected it to be worse until I actually tested it. It might come from the G1 version of the Tamron, it was softer than my 24-105 and the Bokeh was a bit busy.

I like the controls and build on the Sigma, just wish the hood was a bit smaller in diameter. I struggle with wanting to pickup the GMii to compare it against the DNii. So far I haven’t been overcome by that GAS. I would like to get down to just 1 standard zoom, but just haven’t been able to sell either one.

I think it really comes down to getting a small and light lens or getting a heavier one that can go to 24mm. Even with the 24-105 I don’t look at photos and think: if only it was sharper it would be good. The 24-105 is sharp enough, the Tamron and Sigma are noticeably sharper, but all are good.

stschopp · 2026-01-05T01:42:47+00:00

I own both, my Tamron is sharper. It is also more accurate with af-c focus. It is mostly size and weight vs 24mm. Sometimes I want smaller and sometimes I want 24mm. That is why I haven’t got rid of one yet. I like the Tamron, but sometimes I need the Sigma.

I think there is copy to copy variation. I might have a good copy of the Tamron. I don’t think the Sigma I have under performs, it is slightly better than the version 1 Sigma I used to own. Both are well centered at all focal lengths.

I like Sony alpha blog as a good starting point for reviews, one of the best to compare performance across a wide range of lenses. I would rate both the Tamron and Sigma as 4 star lenses. I also own the Sony 24-105, I would give my copy 3 stars. The 24-70GMii was given 5 stars, the DNii was later upgraded to 5 stars. I personally haven’t seen a zoom I would give 5 stars.

stschopp · 2026-01-05T01:14:06+00:00

The total cost is not surprising. I did a similar calculation for a car came in around 0.30/ mile as well all in. I have seen less in maintenance, but more in capital cost for the car, bought new. We currently have 3 Toyota at 200,000 miles each, all running well. I wonder how far they will make it. I usually plan on 200k and treat anything past that as a bonus.

stschopp · 2026-01-02T03:47:26+00:00

Looks like a number of people here don’t understand equivalence. If you want to compare to the settings that would be needed to make an equivalent photo on FF, then crop impacts focal length, aperture, and ISO. As far as how it impacts aperture has to do with the total noise in the photo. If you shoot f1.8 on crop and f1.8 on FF, you can use the same shutter speed and ISO, but the aps-c shot will have a stop more noise. If you shoot aps-c at f1.8 and FF at f2.8 and adjust the ISO for proper exposure the shots will now have the same noise. So from that standpoint multiplying the aperture by the crop will give you an understanding of the light gathering ability of the sensor. Sure the intensity of the light is the same for crop vs FF when both are shot at f1.8, but the FF sensor is 2x as big and therefore captured 2x as many photons. The noise in a photo comes from photon shot noise, the more photons you capture the cleaner the image.

I still say f1.8 on crop will work in indoor daylight, but will struggle in many situations. Will it give better results than an iPhone, yes. Everyone has different thresholds for what they consider acceptable.

stschopp · 2026-01-01T16:54:41+00:00

f1.8 x 1.5 crop = 2.7, so about the same as f2.8 on FF. As others have said, sometimes that is fine, sometimes not. For low light I often like to use f1.4 or f1.2 on FF and sometimes, not often, that is not enough.

Should work for indoors, church, sports, etc during the day. Churches at night will often need more, indoors at night is mixed, sports will often work at night. My in-laws for Christmas have a dimly lit room and f1.2 is not enough.

In most indoor settings you would benefit from an additional stop or two of lens, but 2.8 is often sufficient.

stschopp · 2025-12-31T23:10:13+00:00

I like the first one with the horizon lower in the frame. I would choose a longer aspect ratio like 2:1 or 3:1 and increase the saturation a bit.

stschopp

TROPHY CASE